


it's hard to dance with the devil on your back

by AKL



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Chance Meetings, Cowboy Hats, Fluff, Historical, Historical Accuracy, How Do I Tag, Light Angst, M/M, Missing Scene, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Softie Crowley (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-06-30 13:53:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19854565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AKL/pseuds/AKL
Summary: 1887, Old West America. Where each man is left to go to hell in his own way, and two man-shaped beings hedonistically involve themselves.(or, aziraphale and crowley happen to meet each other in the wild west)





	it's hard to dance with the devil on your back

**Author's Note:**

  * For [incalyscent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/incalyscent/gifts).



Aziraphale hadn't _meant_ to get caught up in the cowboys and the gunplay. He'd only popped over to investigate a first edition copy of Mark Twain, but there had been a rude man bothering some poor young lady, and Aziraphale couldn't just stand by and do _nothing_ , so he'd extended a small miracle in the man's direction to make it… so he wouldn't bother anyone again. 

The young woman had seen, and she'd shrieked, and she'd run off and told anyone who would listen how  _ the Molly-house-lookin' fella dusted some ratbag clear outta town,  _ and of  _ course  _ the townspeople took that to mean something different than it did and before Aziraphale knew it he had a sheriff's star pinned to his waistcoat and the loyalty of a small city in his hands. 

He'd feel amiss if he hadn't taken it as the opportunity it was to spread the Lord's good word.

But it also meant he had to deliver the town from Evil. 

Which is where he found himself now, irksome as it was.

The sky was bluer than blue had any right to be. The air was dry, and the dust burned hot in the back of his throat as he stared at the man standing just outside the gambling house. 

He'd been told this man had cheated at a game of cards. Whatever game it was, he couldn't find it in himself to particularly care - it was the fact that the man stooped so low as to cheat at all that spurred Aziraphale into action. 

The man looked up from his boots as Aziraphale approached, though his face was still hidden beneath the dark line of his hat. "You're the law around here?" The man asked, his voice sharp and familiar in the heat. 

"Yes," Aziraphale replied. "Please accept the consequences of your behavior, young man, if it isn't too much trouble." 

The stranger's fingers twitched close to his waist, where Aziraphale saw the glint of smoky metal shine in the daylight, and with a heavy swallow, Aziraphale drew his weapon. 

"Give me your gun," he said, and he hoped his voice made it clear how little room for argument there was.

The figure, dressed black despite the unrelenting sun, shifted. His hand flickered nearer to his holster, and with only the barest implication of fear, he spoke. "I'll give you what's in it first." 

"Son, that isn't-" he paused. Blinked. Squinted.  _ That voice  _ did _ sound familiar.  _ " _ …Crowley?" _

"Wha-  _ Aziraphale?"  _

Aziraphale's ivory pistol (empty of bullets, not that anyone else needed to know) was pocketed almost immediately. "My dear boy! How on Earth did you wind up here?" 

"I could ask you the same thing," Crowley snapped, and as he strode closer Aziraphale could see the dark scruff around his jaw, the dirt streaked across his brow, the sweat discoloring his shirt. 

Aziraphale sniffed. "Trying to offer a bit of Divine influence, naturally." He puffed out his chest like a bird caught in the middle of preening. "I haven't seen you since-"

"Since St. James, yes," Crowley interrupted, still rather testily. "I'm well aware, angel."

"Now, Crowley, I understand if you're still upset about the holy water-"

_ "Upset!  _ That's hardly the word, angel.  _ Irritated _ , that's what I am."

"-irritated, then. I'm sorry, dear, truly, but I can't in good conscience  _ give _ you such a thing. Can't we just… let bygones be bygones?"

Crowley glowered at him.

"There's a saloon in town that serves the most  _ heavenly _ cornbread."

Crowley's face remained impassioned, for a moment. Then he pulled at the brim of his hat and let out a long-suffering sigh, the likes of which made the knot in Aziraphale's stomach loosen, if only a little. "Oh, alright," he muttered. "After you, sheriff."

He gestured for Aziraphale to go ahead, but Aziraphale gave him a tight-lipped frown, and he knew Crowley rolled his eyes behind those dark glasses of his by the way his body curved and his chin angled. In one fluid motion they both began the walk into town, side by side, spurs jingling in the quiet. 

The American West was vast. So vast it reminded him very nearly of Mesopotamia, before the Great Flood had come and stripped it of its nakedness, of its people and of its raw brown earth. Before the receding waters let grass grow and flowers blossom. Before it metamorphosed from the deserts that lay outside of Eden to Eden itself. 

He'd have to ask Crowley if he felt the same way, once they sat down.

**Author's Note:**

> "it ain't those parts of the Bible that i can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that i do understand."  
> \- mark twain


End file.
